SPIE Fellow Aydogan Ozcan, the Chancellor's Professor at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) who pioneered the area of lensless, high‐throughput cytometry and computational on-chip microscopy platforms, has received the 2015 ICO Prize from the International Commission for Optics (ICO).

Ozcan, who is also an SPIE Senior Member and a founder of Holomic, a young technology company making mobile diagnostic devices, was recognized for seminal contributions to biophotonics technologies impacting computational microscopy and digital holography for telemedicine and global health applications.

The ICO Prize is given to groundbreaking researchers in optics who are under the age of 40. Ozcan, 37, has developed a range of high-throughput computational photonics tools for use in metrology, telemedicine, and other biomedical applications.

Ozcan is the Chancellor's Professor of Electrical Engineering and Bioengineering at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science and an HHMI professor with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. His UCLA lab has developed holographic on-chip microscopy platforms that can image single nanoparticles and viruses and detect cancer and other abnormalities at the single-cell level. Using partially coherent digital in‐line holography and liquid nano-lenses, these systems can analyze more than 100,000 cells within a few seconds over a sample field of view of >10‐20 cm2.

Ozcan's lab has also developed lightweight, 3D-printed smartphone attachments that can diagnose diseases such as malaria and HIV; detect mercury and pathogens such as giardia and E. coli in water samples; and find allergens in prepared food. These mobile devices are portable and cost-effective, making them practical for use in environmental monitoring in rural and resource-poor areas. Some of these inventions have been commercialized by Holomic and are being used in more than 10 countries.

"I am honored and humbled to have received this prestigious award and to join past recipients whom I have long admired and respected for their pioneering work and impact," Ozcan said.

Ozcan is the recipient of 32 issued patents and numerous awards including the 2013 SPIE Biophotonics Technology Innovator Award and the 2011 SPIE Early Career Achievement Award.

He is scheduled to give a presentation on on-chip microscopy, sensing, and diagnostics 15 February 2016 at SPIE Photonics West, and HE is a member of the program committees of four conferences at Photonics West.

Ozcan received his PhD at Stanford University in 2005. He has been at UCLA since 2007 where he currently leads the Bio- and Nano-Photonics Lab and is associate director of the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI).